Session 9
The gang returned to find a rather somber mood among the villagers. But (after missing a couple of cues) a mysterious and quite handsome bard started strumming his lute, playing a song to try to cheer up the villagers. After he was done playing, the party started talking to the stranger, who introduced himself as Lovthan. They were skeptic of him at first, but after a couple of rounds of juggling daggers, and Lovthan describing his vast skills ranging from dancing lights to minor illusion, the party decided to take him with them. Oh and there was this business about him knowing about a possible secret entrance to a cave. After stocking up on food, the party set out on their quest. A short walk later, the party found themselves facing a dreadful monster with a catlike form and an eerie aura about it. A fight broke out, and although this creature could split into multiples, it was still no match for this gang. They waited around the corpse a bit for an orb, and sure enough, it appeared. Shortly after the business with the monster, they found a way into some kind of temple. After a bit of arguing about who was going to be the one to spring the trap that may or may not be there, they, or as it was, Nez opened the door, which made him rather light headed. He cursed his party members, some cursed back, others smiled kindly. Upon opening the door, they saw a weird creature being attacked by multiple slimes. After having flashbacks to a certain green friend, they decided to attack the slimes with motives ranging from wanting to help the unknown creature, to just wanting to kill something. It was a rather short fight, because amid the cluster of the wild swinging of swords and casting of magic, Lovthan had the briliant idea of scaring the slimes using his minor illusion to make it seems as though a monstrous roar was coming from somewhere rather too close. The slimes took off in a hurry, but not before grabbing a sword. Alas no matter how fast the slimes could "run", death was much faster on this occasion, and they all met their swift and brutal end. After a bit of talking to the attacked creature, which they dubbed Jakey, they found that there were multiple more creatures like him further into the building, being given orders by someone called the emissary. Thanks to Nez' magic they could ask the creature whatever they needed to know, but all they could get out of him was that humans were supposed to be dead and that his mission was to open the doors. Upon hearing this, Nez locked the doors, as the others distracted Jakey. The party decided that they needed some rest, but Jakey didn't like not doing anything. So Lovthan, in yet another stroke of brilliance, made the future ever so brighter by showing Jakey how to dance, and then left him to it. Mid-rest however, a huge black slime crashed down from the ceiling, almost crushing two people. The fight was swift, if brutal. The brave adventurers had defeated peril yet again, and may or may not have had to revive someone. Shortly after, Jakey powered down, and the party rested yet again, undisturbed this time. Shortly after moving further into the building, a crashing sound was heard along with the ground shaking. This didn't seem to disturb anyone too much, and they kept moving. After a couple of feats of athleticism and strength, our brave adventurers entered a room one by one, where they found a basilisk. And just as they had entered one by one, they turned to stone one by one. As all hope seemed lost, Lovthan got an idea that might just be crazy enough to work. He used his minor illusion to put a mirror in front of the basilisk, making it turn to stone. With half the party turned to stone, things looked grim, but Lovthan and Nez, the only ones that didn't get petrified, at least not in body, carried on to find a cure for their friends. After asking the now awake Jakey for help, which he wasn't much of, the party carried on, taking only minor falling damage, to wherever they could. Shortly after, they found a room with a rather scary looking gargoyle in it. The gargoyle explained how this was a place of pilgrimage for followers of saint thief, and that all they needed to do was to press a couple of buttons for some doors and then pull the lever to open the ones they'd chosen. Nez pressed all the buttons while Lovthan strummed his lute. Right before they pulled the lever, Lovthan set up a cloud of dagger in case there should be any enemies. And as they found out when they pulled the lever, there was enemies, more than any one man could count. Nez kept trying, and failing, to find a position where he could see and attack the enemies, without being in their range. Jakey fought bravely along with another creature of his kind. One by one the enemies, slimes, turned into either boiled slime or a slime smoothie, and things seemed like they would be allright. But then both Jakey and his newfound friend of the same kind fell, never to get up. And for the first time in his life, Lovthan felt the unkind sting of losing someone so dear to him. The session ended in the middle of the heat of the battle.